KUALA LUMPUR: Mimos Bhd’s latest homegrown WiWi Technology Platform, the world’s first hybrid between the WiFi and WiMAX solutions, is expected to help accelerate Malaysia’s broadband penetration target, Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Datuk Maximus Ongkili said yesterday.

Mimos has agreed to collaborate with three WiMAX operators —REDtone International Bhd, Packet One Networks (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd and Asiaspace Sdn Bhd — in deploying WiWi.

WiWi provides WiMAX players and other industry players an additional solution, apart from those already available in the market, to deploy their services more cost-effectively to the masses, Ongkili said.

Mimos, a premier applied research centre in frontier technologies, is an agency under the ministry.

“WiWi provides consumers affordable broadband connectivity that allows multiple users to tap into a single broadband connection,” Ongkili said in his speech which was read by deputy minister Fadillah Yusof at the launch of the Mimos WiFi Technology Platform here.

“This simply means that the solution would assist the nation to not only provide broadband for the general population but also assist in bridging the digital divide, especially in the rural areas,” he said.

At present, Malaysia has over 16 million Internet users or an Internet penetra-tion rate of 63.8 per cent.

Statistics showed that despite the current 24 per cent household broadband penetration rate, more people in the country are adopting the use of broadband, so much that it is now perceived more of a necessity than a luxury, Ongkili said.

“It is crucial then that the government and the industry work together to increase household broadband uptake to 50 percent by 2010,” he said.

Speaking to reporters later, Mimos president and chief executive Datuk Abdul Wahab Abdullah said each of the three WiMAX firms would be given 50 units of the WiWi router to be produced by CEEDTec Sdn Bhd.

“They (the WiMAX firms) are currently testing the WiWi. By next month, it’s definite they can try out the technology,” he said.

REDtone group chief executive officer Zainal Amanshah said the firm had already deployed the two WiWi units which it received from Mimos in the Resource Development and IT Ministry in Sabah.

“The plug-and-play WiWi routers will enhance the deployment of our WiMAX service in Sabah and Sarawak,” he said.

— Bernama